Complementary metal-oxide semiconductor (CMOS) devices typically employ at least one gate which is separated from a conducting channel (or channels) of the device by a gate dielectric material. Examples of such CMOS devices that employ a gate dielectric material include, but are not limited to, field effect transistors (FETs). By way of example, FETs have been used in application specific integrated circuit (ASIC) devices, microprocessor devices, etc. A specific type of FET, known as a finFET, has become a choice for 22 nanometer (nm) technologies and beyond. The finFET device is characterized by the conducting channel being formed by a raised silicon fin structure, which is separated from a surrounding gate by a gate dielectric material. System-on-a-chip (SOC) designs typically employ high speed finFET devices for applications including, but not limited to, input/output (I/O) devices, analog functions, embedded dynamic random access memory (DRAM), etc.